


deserve

by sleepdeprivedphilosopher



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Author Is Sleep Deprived, Castiel and Dean Winchester Need to Use Their Words, Dean Winchester is Bad at Feelings, Ficlet, First In The Fandom, M/M, One Shot, Post-Episode: s15e09 The Trap, Season 15, Stream of Consciousness, and i love him, and regrets everything, cas is very patient, dean winchester being dramatic for twelve hundred words, just communicate, no beta we die like men, please i'm so tired, they're killing me, when will my sleeping pattern return from war, why can't these assbutts get their shit together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:33:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22507114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepdeprivedphilosopher/pseuds/sleepdeprivedphilosopher
Summary: It was wrong. Wrong to treat his best friend like that. Wrong to treat the angel that dragged him out of hell, and that kept him out of it ever since like that. That came when Dean called even after Dean raged at him.It was wrong to treat the love of his life that way.And that was what Cas was, wasn't he?Cas has endless forgiveness. Dean has endless anger. It's a constant struggle between them.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 4
Kudos: 43





	deserve

**Author's Note:**

> hey void, 
> 
> so this is my first time writing a spn fic. even though I've been lurking around the fandom for years and years at this point. every time I think I'm out they drag me back in. dean and cas will drag me back into their bullshit and I'm just so damn weak. 
> 
> so yeah I guess I have a lot of feelings about them and about this season so I wrote a bit about it. I dunno where it came from, but it's almost six in the morning so here ya go. 
> 
> enjoy?

For as long as Dean can remember, he has always been angry. 

Even back when he was a kid trying to keep a smile on for Sammy for his baby brother, he was angry. He was pissed at the entire world, and he didn't know enough about shit back then to know why. 

If he is being honest with himself (and when is he ever honest with himself), he'd say that he still doesn't know enough about shit _now_. 

Sure he can guess. Guess that the kind of childhood he had (or rather the lack of a childhood) gave him this anger. Or at least it was the start. It was easier to be angry, maybe, easier than acknowledging how hurt he felt all the time. Then trying to find a way to manage the constant pressure on his too-thin shoulders. 

A pressure that had only been increasing over the years with every person they lost. With every near world ending and every saving and he remembers people (well sometimes they were people) telling him how important he was. He was the righteous man; he was a firewall between light and darkness. He was everything to everyone, and if he thought about it too much, then he'd just start screaming. But he couldn't scream. He couldn't break. Dean had work to do. 

So he kept a tight grip on his control. But he was only human (he's the righteous man, a firewall, but he is also so so human) meaning sometimes his control snaps. 

Mostly his control snaps with Cas. Because somehow Cas has become his harbor in the storm. Something he could always come back to someone who was always going to be there. Someone who could take all the rage Dean had in him and still call him _good_. 

Still follow him and trust him and just _be there_. He couldn't ask the same of Sam. He couldn't ask the same of any lovers or relationships he could claim — not even parental ones like Bobby or Mary. 

He's had his fair share of fights and anger with all them, but nothing like this. Not this constant picking at them. He forgave and forgave and forgave them. 

But not Cas. Cas had to be perfect, and even when he wasn't, that was somehow okay because Dean could yell at him then. Dean could rage at him. Cas was an angel (literally) he could take it. 

Cas who felt so little of himself already could take more abuse at Dean's hands. And Dean knew that he was hurting him. That Cas didn't deserve to take the brunt of Dean's unlimited, endless rage at the world, at God, at his father, at Sam, at everyone who had ever aided in placing that pressure on his shoulders. 

Cas could take it. 

Until he couldn't. 

Until he didn't. 

Until he looked at Dean with tired, tired eyes and said, "There's nothing more to say." 

As if things between them had ever been that simple. As if there weren't a decade's worth of unsaids separating them from something both of them wanted. 

But Dean always had a reason to stay quiet. So he didn't say anything. He didn't call Cas back. Didn't tell him to stay. Didn't say that he was sorry. Didn't say Cas was the best thing in his life in spite of the shit he had done and that Dean was so so grateful for him. For his punching bag. For his outlet. Because somehow between one apocalypse, half a dozen mistakes and a trip to purgatory, that's what Cas had become. 

And even when Cas died. Even when Dean got to experience what life would be like without him (dark and pointless and full of anger with no release). Even when he got him back Dean's default response to blame Cas when things went wrong (and they always did, Cas said it himself) remained. His habit of finding ways to make it Cas's fault even if usually at most it was fifty/fifty (or worse Dean's fault entirely).

It was wrong. Wrong to treat his best friend like that. Wrong to treat the angel that dragged him out of hell, and that kept him out of it ever since like that. That came when he called even after Dean raged at him. 

It was wrong to treat the love of his life that way. 

And that was what Cas was, wasn't he? 

Cas was too good for him. Always had been. Dean wondered time and time again why he stayed. Why he always came back. 

It was why he didn't question it when Cas walked out the bunker doors and out of his life. _You and Sam have each other._

Then he stayed gone, and a part of Dean was proud. Proud to see Cas standing up for himself for once. It hurt like hell to be on the receiving end, but still. It felt like progress. 

Cas did come back eventually (and Dean loves him loves him), but things were still tense between them. Dean needed to apologize he knew it, but he was stubborn and clueless, and he was worried really that if he said the wrong thing Cas would go away and this time he'd be gone for good (which is just what Dean deserves really.) 

But then they went to the place where things had fallen apart for them. But also where they'd come together enough for them to fall apart at all. Dean lost Cas once in purgatory, and the mere thought of having that again, of losing him again, of Cas dying or being separated from Dean forever was enough motivation for a desperate prayer, a plea, an actual fucking apology. 

So tears streaming down his face, he told Cas some of the things he'd kept locked away in his heart. He wanted to tell him all of them and when he saw Cas walking towards him when he had Cas in his arms. He almost told him. 

But Cas said he knew, and they were running out of time, so Dean didn't. 

He didn't, and they made it back. 

Afterall Cas was too good for him. Even if things were better now, Dean knew that. Dean couldn't tell Cas that he was the love of his life. 

What's one human lifespan to that of an angel, anyway? What's Dean's life? Cas doesn't deserve to be with something so broken and brief. 

Cas deserves more than Dean could ever give him.

But Cas is looking at him now, staring just like he always has for as long as Dean's known him. He's smiling a little, and there's a shine in his eyes that conveys forgiveness. Endless, endless forgiveness. Endless forgiveness for Dean's endless anger. 

It's a constant fight between them. A push and pull. A test to see which will burn out first. 

Cas must believe his forgiveness will last longer than Dean's anger. Just like (if Dean has anything to say about it), Cas's life will last longer than his. But Dean isn't so sure. He's wary of the day when he pushes too far and Cas isn't around to pull back. 

Still, Cas smiles at him like nothing Dean could ever do would make him reach that point. 

Dean doesn't deserve him, but what had Adam said about them getting what they deserved?

**Author's Note:**

> this work was completed and posted at 5:50 on a saturday morning. I have to work at eight-thirty today. I don't know why I made this decision, but here we are. I blame cas and dean and their inability to communicate. 
> 
> just please spn writers give them a happy ending. don't we all deserve that? 
> 
> -still sleep deprived.
> 
> come find me on tumblr! [@sleepdeprivedphilosopher](https://sleepdeprivedphilosopher.tumblr.com//)


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